Cruise Control (CC) systems for motor vehicles, when manually activated, automatically maintain the motor vehicle at a selected driving speed, referred to as a “Set Speed” or “vehicle cruise speed”.
Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) systems for motor vehicles, when manually activated, also maintain the motor vehicle, referred to herein as a “host vehicle”, at a selected Set Speed and maintain the host vehicle at a selected “vehicle cruise headway” when a preceding (target) vehicle is disposed in the path of the host vehicle.
Semi-Autonomous and Autonomous Control systems for motor vehicles, when manually activated, may keep the lane position of the vehicle on a road. Such systems may additionally permit a “set-speed” to be selected by the driver of the vehicle (as in cruise control) and/or may additionally permit a “headway” to be selected by the driver of the vehicle as in ACC systems. Such systems may also comprise a queue assist or traffic jam assist feature which enables the host vehicle to follow a target vehicle at slow speeds and at short distances.
The present invention seeks to provide an improvement in the field of semi-autonomous and autonomous control systems for motor vehicles. Embodiments of the invention may provide an activation system suitable for semi-autonomous and autonomous control systems for motor vehicles, which is quick and simple for the driver of the vehicle to invoke and which avoids the need for the driver to press control buttons.